1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a brass instrument hand held mouthpiece visualizer teaching aid designed for correcting playing faults in dealing with the interior embouchure of brass instrument players such as trumpet, trombone, French horn, tuba players and the like.
2. Prior Art
It is a known fact that in order for a brass player, beginner or advanced, to become successful, he or she must master the embouchure. The embouchure is the shaping of the lips, tongue and other organs in producing a musical tone on a wind instrument. The embouchure of a wind instrument player can be equated to the vocal cords of a vocalist and it is believed that the embouchure is one of the major factors in the proper production and control of tone and musical sound in a wind instrument. The embouchure must be developed through the proper use and development of the organs involved in playing a wind instrument. It has been found that each player of a wind instrument has a different embouchure and what may be proper or suitable for one individual may not be suitable for another.
I have found that a brass player's embouchure has two basic parts consisting of the interior and exterior sections. The exterior section of the brass player's embouchure consists of the organs and muscles that surround the mouthpiece rim after it has been placed on the player's lips. The interior section of the brass player's embouchure consists of all the organs and muscles that function on the inside of the brass mouthpiece after the mouthpiece has been positioned.
In order to appreciate the importance of the interior embouchure and of my invention, it will be useful to consider a few of the interior embouchure problems experienced by brass players. First, many brass players have the tendency to distort or jam the tone in both the middle and high brass registers due to pinching the lips too tightly together in the interior embouchure. This technique prevents the lips from vibrating freely and causes players to execute their instruments with unnecessary force. This in turn creates poor blood circulation through the lips, and can eventually cause permanent injury to the lip muscles that results in poor, fuzzy tonal qualities that may never be corrected. Since it is a known fact that brass musicians who hold responsible positions are selected primarily on the basis of the tonal quality of their playing, this interior embouchure fault can place a permanent limitation on a player's playing ability and opportunities.
Second, correct tonguing is very important to the player's interior embouchure and his performance ability. The tongue must not be pushed between the lips but rather the tip of the tongue should touch behind the upper front teeth. If the tongue does not function as mentioned and the student does not have the ability to overcome these tonguing deficiencies, good tonal attacks, which are necessary to articulate difficult tonguing passages, will not be developed.
A third common playing fault takes place when the lower lip of the interior embouchure slips behind the upper lip. This can be corrected by making sure that the upper and lower lips of the interior embouchure are exactly opposite each other. If the lower lip tends to slip behind the upper lip in the interior embouchure, the player should push the lower lip out to meet the upper lip by using the lower teeth and jaw. This will then allow the lips to vibrate properly.
A fourth playing fault of the interior embouchure concerns the aperture. If the brass mouthpiece is placed too high on the upper lip in the interior embouchure, a small aperture or opening through which the air must flow will be created and only a small portion of the bottom lip will vibrate, thus causing a very small tone and extreme difficulty in performing the high register. An aperture must be found in the interior embouchure that will permit both a large sound and playing throughout the full register.
Although the importance of the interior embouchure is known to be the key to the success or failure of a brass player, heretofore brass players with interior embouchure problems, such as those discussed above and others, have found it extremely difficult to discover solutions to these problems because they are unable to ascertain what transpires on the inside of the brass mouthpiece where the interior embouchure functions. Up to now the trial and error method has been the only means available to help brass players with interior embouchure problems. It is understood that at one time a mouthpiece rim with a stem on it was proposed for brass instrument instructors to observe a student's interior embouchure but the device was not successful.
It is the object of my invention to provide a means for setting the interior embouchure of brass players and to correct faults therewith.